


Awoken

by TypingBosmer



Series: Meraad Astaarit, Meraad Itwasit, Tamassran Aqun [4]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: (Not enough to warrant the Drunk Sex Tag but it's there), Alcohol, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Denial of Feelings, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/M, Oral Sex, Pegging, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:40:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25770751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TypingBosmer/pseuds/TypingBosmer
Summary: It has been a while since Issala Adaar defeated Magister Alexius and recruited him into the Inquisition. By the time she decides to invite him to her quarters to relieve his tension as a hard-working researcher, their animosity has long since transformed into a warm friendship. And something more - something that Alexius believes a man with his past does not deserve.
Relationships: Female Adaar/Gereon Alexius, Gereon Alexius/Female Inquisitor
Series: Meraad Astaarit, Meraad Itwasit, Tamassran Aqun [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/840450
Comments: 8
Kudos: 13





	Awoken

**Author's Note:**

> I added this to a series, but there should be enough info to read this smutty one-shot as a standalone. This is my first time writing such an explicit fic (one where body parts are actually named instead of danced around in purple prose!). Please bear with me as I myself am ace.

Gereon Alexius knows better than anyone that everything changes with the passage of time. Usually, the change is for the worse.

But this - this is for the better, he thinks to himself, as he tears away from his papers with a small smile, to greet his late-night guest.

Before time, like a thoughtless, careless giant, swept them both up and tossed them left and right, from one battle to another, he and the Inquisition’s Qunari Herald were mortal enemies.

He was the embodiment of everything her people, and the rest of the world, hated about his - a cackling, grasping slaver that needed to be stopped before the order of creation came undone at his bloodied touch.

She was the obstacle in the way towards his one-time master’s glory - towards a glorious future, as enticing as it was false, for him, his homeland, and his family.

That was then.

Now, he works for her Inquisition, with more zeal and dedication than he ever did for the Venatori. Because the Elder One’s cult dragged him down into the abyss, and the Inquisition helped him claw his way back on top again, with the Herald standing at the forefront, her hand extended with a quiet smile to help him up.

Now, they both carry scars where one took an arrow, or a lightning bolt, or a grazing blade, for the other. (Although he does hope that her scars have mended properly; his healing skills have to be worth something).

Now, he always feels a little brighter… dare he say… happier?… when he hears the familiar footfalls behind his door - no longer guarded and crisscrossed by heavy chains to keep the ‘maleficar’ in - and then, a soft scrape of two horns against the too-low doorframe. And finally, her voice, deep and calm and soothing.

'Good evening. Still at work, I see’.

'Good evening, Inq… Issala’.

He stumbles over her name, still unused, always unused, to the familiarity. She chuckles at his awkwardness - she always does - and he echoes, looking up at her from his modest human height in anticipation.

Perhaps she has come to talk about philosophy again. Perhaps the Inquisition found the book he requisitioned, and, as usual, she would like to pass it on to him personally. Perhaps there is another art exhibition in Val Royeaux, and she has told her advisors that him accompanying her is vital for 'mission success’. Perhaps…

Suddenly, without warning, her hands are on his shoulders, pressing at the tight, painful knot he did not realize he had across his slouching spine. Kneading the tension away.

She has touched him before.

A warm, reassuring weight on his shoulder whenever the memories of his lost love, his dying son, his squandered aspirations came crushing down on him all over again.

A casual brush of callused grey fingers whenever they sat side by side, drawing - a pastime that Gereon’s peers had once wrinkled their noses at as a frivolous distraction fit for a Laetan at best, and Issala’s people considered a worthy craft.

Once, they even had to embrace for warmth - when the Elder One had tossed Issala into the howling dark, and Gereon had been left behind in the snow by the evacuating Inquisition, and they chanced to cross paths.

And every single time, every single touch, has felt as if Gereon had been asleep for a long, long time, restless and forlorn without his Livia, and the sensation of the large, strong, living hand passing over his skin was waking him up.

And this particular motion sends a little shiver through him, and then, an inkling of heat that strengthens when it reaches his throat. He can scarcely croak a reply when Issala asks him, her voice enveloping him like a warm, serene sea,

'You have been toiling away with no rest lately’.

'I… It’s a… very interesting research project’.

'Be that as it may’.

Her hands stop, and Gereon wishes that the pause that follows, filled with nothing but their quiet breathing, would both end as quickly as possible, and last forever.

'You are going to…’

She hmms slightly, searching for the right expression in the Trade Tongue, which she only started learning a few years before the ill-fated Conclave.

'Burn yourself out. I wonder… Are all your needs being met?’

'Are all my… what?’ he repeats, dumb, breathless, and suddenly so weak that he is not certain that he will be able to rise from his desk without falling into her arms. Those large, muscled warrior’s arms. Which he may have… watched with some interest when they were bared and glinted with sweat during a sparring session with her kinsman.

'Are all your needs being met?’

She does not raise her voice, but he can feel an undertone of insistence.

Her next question is so blunt that it knocks the wind out of him (which, again, would have resulted into falling into her arms were he standing).

'When was the last time you had sex?’

He gulps, and stares very pointedly at his fingers.

He should be outraged, probably. He would have been if he was still a magister. But what is he now, if not a humble old man in the company of a breathtakingly… tall woman that used to be a Tamassran?

She is just asking him this out of a concern for his physical health; it is not much different from asking if he was hungry, or… or thirsty…

'I… I haven’t… Since Livia died, I wasn’t really… I used to… enjoy it… quite often… But then… Things kept happening, and…’

And then, to his horror, he hears himself say,

'I rather miss it’.

She laughs, kindly, beautifully, and the weakness overtakes him once again.

She - she did ask, didn’t she? Does that mean that she thinks him - him, who has turned over a half-century of life - the kind of person that could still…

Well, he believes that she is over forty herself, not that he would pry for a lady’s exact age - but time has been kinder to her. Time has been kind enough to obey her and Dorian when they fixed his horrible, world-shattering mistakes.

That is to say. He must be hideous in her eyes, surely; far more hideous than the lovers, human or otherwise, that she truly deserves. And yet she did ask, didn’t she?

'Would it be an insult to our friendship if, one day, we got together in this manner and appreciated each other in an intimate per… performance…’

He gets tangled up in making his question more and more elaborately polite. This never would have happened to him in Redcliffe - but he does not want to be the man he was back then. Before time intervened.

She moves beside him, and cups his chin in her palm, so that their eyes finally meet. Her amber gaze scorches him like dragon fire, and he leans into her touch upon instinct, his cheek burning against her skin.

'Of course it would not. You have come to be very important to me; we have been through so much together. I would love to properly help you unwind… One day’.

'Today,’ he corrects her impulsively, feeling himself melt away under her intent, glinting eyes, like the embers of a rising flame.

Important. He is important. And surely not in the way the man in Redcliffe was.

'Please let it be today’.

She smiles, and he is bold enough to imagine a glimmer of fondness, shining upon him through her lowered eyelashes.

'Follow me to my quarters. There is more space there, and I keep some supplies that we might find useful’.

Her tone is brisk and almost businesslike when she tells him this.

Tamassran aqun, the Iron Bull says about her, with a half-hushed reverence. Once a Tamassran, always a Tamassran. Caring teacher and avid learner, keen philosopher, enthusiastic artist… And connoisseur of, uh, intimate performances.

She walks just as briskly too, when she leads Gereon upstairs to her vast, moonlit chamber. He jumps at the sight of silent, hooded figures patrolling the hallways, but they do not stop him. Not any more.

During his first weeks as Inquisition researcher, he was monitored day and night - but apparently, the Spymaster has gotten tired of reading all the reports of him saving the Lady Herald’s life, and dismissed her bloodhounds. Not that he will stop saving Issala any time soon - especially since she is the one who currently holds the record for saving him.

Then, come the necessary preparations. Measures to prevent infection. He tries to help, as best he can, even though his hands are shaking, and the drumming beat in his ears gains strength with each glimpse of Issala’s form. Six feet of honed, scar-crossed muscle, free of the clothing that she has left folded in a neat pile on a stool.

A northerner like him, she was wearing layers to keep the draughts of Skyhold away. But in here, the fire is roaring in a kind of unabashed glee, and the air is almost summerlike, sweet with the curling, silvery smoke of incense sticks that are placed here and there. A reminder of how home smells, amid the lands of wet dog and mouldy cheese.

She has been gliding on the waves of this scented warmth, graceful and regal, searching for toys to offer him and revealing more and more of herself.

Oh, how delightful is would have been - to be the one undressing her. The one stripping the constricting fabric off these rolling shoulders, this broad, toned back, this sculpted abdomen, these shapely, steel-hard thighs… But, perched at the foot of her bed, he is still half-caught in his own robe like a hapless fish. Too mesmerized by her to dare offer his help, or ask for hers. And too overwhelmed to choose from her selection.

She chuckles indulgently at his predicament.

'I see you are still tense. Let us start small then. Perhaps this will make you less hesitant’.

She approaches a small cabinet and takes out a wicker-bound bottle and two squat glasses, each just a little bigger than a thimble.

He squints.

'Is that the same liquor Bull drinks to celebrate his dragon-slaying?’

She moves the bottle to a bedside shelf, pours out the liquor, and sits next to him. Her gaze, her whole presence, the subtle, musky scent of her perfume - it all makes the fire’s heat tighten its grip around him. As though he were being pressed against a rage demon’s chest.

His whole being thrums with excitement, and he hastens to cast off his robe at last, earning a nod of approval.

'The glasses are so small that you would need about ten of these to begin losing your mind. See?’

She takes a gulp from her own glass, tilts her head with a tiny shudder, and extends the second glass to him. He accepts, lingering for an indulgent second when their hands meet, and instinctively extends his little finger as he raises the glass to cheer for her.

The liquor cuts its way down his throat like a rod of white-hot iron, but the sensation soon melts away into a soothing tingle. He is more used to enjoying this effect from a fine vintage wine harvested somewhere in Vyranthium, but he has to give the Qunari drink its due.

'That is… Not too bad,’ he says, once he finds his voice. 'Not bad at all. I would not mind another, I think’.

'Then I will drink too, to make it even,’ Issala replies.

After she swallows, her grey cheeks darken with a flush, and she smirks mischievously. 'You, though, will receive a special treat’.

She takes the glass from Gereon’s hand, refills it - and then carefully lays herself on the bed, spreads her legs, and positions the glass between them, holding it in place with her thighs.

He freezes, seemingly wiped of all sight and hearing and understanding… But only for a moment. Like a flood wave filling a river bed that has been left cracked and dry in the summer, his former adventurous spirit, which seeped away through the cracks when Livia was taken from him, returns, and fills him to the brim.

He lets out a wicked little laugh, and, taking care not to disturb the glass, edges closer to Issala (thankfully, the bed is wide enough for five people and a mabari or two)… And takes the long route towards his prize.

After all these burning moments of watching and marvelling, he finally catches her lips.

While his tongue slides, trembling, to search for hers, he traces the shape of her face - the broad cheekbone and the maze chart of old scars - with one hand and moves the other downward, brushing along her collarbone with the care of an attentive portraitist, and then cupping her breast. Then, the hand that rested on her face joins in here, too, gripping ever so slightly.

An image flashes at the back of his mind, bright and sharp and dizzying like the incense scent magnified tenfold.

He thinks of releasing a wisp of shock magic. Just enough to make his palms emit a gentle purple glow, which would prickle the warm grey skin underneath with an invigorating charge.

But no - he can’t. Not without permission.

It is one thing to do so to a fellow mage, who would be expecting a little bit of… lightning trickery, and could even set off an involuntary elemental spell in a moment of arousal (there may have been… an occasional tiny fire in his private quarters back in Tevinter). But having a non-mage lover is different. He is not even certain if Issala, for all her extensive experience, has been with a mage before him.

'Can I use magic?’ he asks, as gently as he can, when he breaks the kiss.

She considers his words, eyes half-lidded, chewing absently at her lip.

'Not this time,’ she decides at length. 'I never thought of magic this way, and I need time to weigh this’.

'That is fair,’ he says sincerely, and finds her hand, which rests beside her face, to bring her knuckles to his lips.

She hums in contentment.

'You are doing wonderfully as it is. I love your hands on me, magic or no magic. But perhaps you could hurry up? You might want to take that glass before I am too wet’.

Gereon flushes. He forgot how satisfying it was, to make a lover so excited.

'You know that telling me to hurry up might have consequences,’ he says smugly - and proceeds to slip further down, planting a few kisses over her breasts and along her stomach. Mostly to hide his face because the way she beamed at his little quip might well have made him tear up.

The second drink is down; the glass rolls aside, and any remaining thirst is met with her ready, open sex. The current of memories keeps flowing strong, guiding him as he takes care to taste her properly.

She makes a short, throaty sound when she comes, like the first note of a song. It is followed by what he thinks is a word in Qunlat. Again and again, dancing off her lips and melting into a moan.

Ka… Kadan?

Issala has been teaching him some of her language, as he has been teaching Tevene to her - both languages are profoundly beautiful, and deserve to be studied further than a command to kill the enemy - but he never heard her mention this word before. It must be a cry of pleasure.

He drinks her in for a little longer, and then, with a few extra kisses of appreciation placed swiftly along her inner thighs, lifts himself up to see her expression.

Her hair, which she always ties back into a large, neat bun, has spun undone and is cascading down her pillow in a wine-dark waterfall. Her face radiates such bliss that his heart clenches for a moment.

She has been so generous with him. She shouldn’t have. He does not deserve this. How can he? He failed the woman that he kissed, and pleasured, and cherished before her; she is dead because of him, and Issala would be dead too, if it were not for Dorian. This… This spell of happiness will be fleeting. He will ruin it, one way or the other. Issala may have helped him crawl back up the slope, but the filth that he gathered on the way down will never wash clean. Not with all the waters of the Amaranthine sea.

'Gereon?’ she calls to him, slowly descending from her peak.

The sound of his name on her lips stifles the voice of conscience. His blood rushes like a waterfall, like her dark-red hair, and he feels ridiculously, desperately drunk, even though he shouldn’t, not after just two tiny glasses.

'Those things you showed me,’ he says, recklessly. 'There was that, uh, attachable implement. Could you… wear it? And… Let me ride it?’

'Of course!’ she exclaims, with great gusto. 'We will need a poultice jar too! I do not want you bleeding!’

'I will happily bleed for you,’ he retorts, his smirk returning.

'Not like that, though,’ she scolds him, clicking her tongue in a way that sends another jolt of heat through him.

'No,’ he agrees. 'Not like that’.

…

She has touched him before, each touch an awakening from a bleak and heavy dream, where he was all alone, save for the haunting shadows of his past mistakes.

But he never imagined, never dared hope, even as he stumbled in his tracks when he saw her adjust the fastenings of her pauldron across her chest, that her touches would ever turn into anything like this. Her hand on the small of his back, supporting him from behind during the rhythmic thrusts; the fingers of the other, deft and confident, reaching to clasp his cock, stroking the hardened length and adding, ever adding to the flames that run through him in a dizzying, drunken dance, leaving him a panting, whimpering, flushed mess.

The world skews and blurs around him, and he feels tears stream down his face - happy tears, blessed tears, because he has never felt to exhilarated in a long, long time - while a hoarse voice that he guesses is his cries for Issala. By name at first, and then, again and again, quite in spite of his effort to restrain himself, and in spite of the fact that he mustn’t, mustn’t call her that… Amata. Beloved.

A word that was Livia’s once, before he betrayed the vows and bonds of trust that came with it. Before he stumbled about like an incompetent fool, allowing fate, and time, to consume his wife, and then his son. Someone like him cannot be entrusted with anyone’s affection, anyone’s body - someone like him cannot refer to any woman as Amata. Especially not a woman like Issala, who has been all too forgiving to her former enemy as it is.

Well. At least he did not explain the meaning of this word to her. Perhaps she will interpret it as a cry of pleasure.

His eyes are still glazed with a bleary, weepy pall when he collapsed onto the bed, spent and grateful. Issala helps him clean up - and pulls up her legs to sit beside him, leaning of his much smaller form, the tips of her overhanging hair prickling his skin.

'Better?’ she asks, deep from her chest, while circling her thumb under his eye to caress away his tears.

'Better,’ he half-chokes. And holds his breath, savouring the soft motions of her thumb, and her fingers, which explore the outlines of his face as he did hers.

'You are a beautiful man,’ she tells him, and he feels like choking again.

'I…’

He breathes in shakily, and gathers himself enough for a new quip.

'The Magisterium used to tell me that so often’.

It is a rehash of the dangerously - titillatingly - playful back and forth that he and Issala exchanged before their pretend 'negotiations’. Unimaginative, yes - but it is either that, or bursting into an ugly sob.

Kaffas, he must be hallucinating the tenderness in her gaze. Some spirit must have peeked in through the Veil and tricked his eyes into seeing what his mind is longing for. He cannot, must not, truly believe that it is there. Because that would mean that she… That she might feel… No. There will be no more tenderness for him. He will not know how to properly accept this gift - he will just allow time to crush it all over again. Change everything for the worse.

When he has a better grip on himself, he mumbles, rather helplessly,

'I suppose… After I rest a bit… I should return to my quarters’.

A fleeting shadow of disappointment clouds Issala’s… beautiful, beautiful face.

'You do not have to, but if you think it is best’.

…

That night, in the hazy hours before dawn, Gereon dreams of the abyss that he likened his past to. A narrow, jagged gash in the glistening green rock face of the Fade. Its edge is unsteady under his feet, with a tiny shard of rock chipping off on occasion and skipping down with nary a sound - and its bottom is drowning in inky blackness. As though there were a river down there. Mirror-still, stagnant, and made out of nothingness.

Gereon’s innards clog with nausea after he looks into the inky depths for too long. When he turns away, he meets eyes with a ghostly figure that must have been watching him balance on the edge. It has the same height and built, and as he examines it closer, he realizes, with a new onset of nausea, that the fraying rags that it is wearing were once a Venatori robe. Rusty red, like old, caked-up blood.

The space under its hood is as indiscernibly black as the abyss - save for two cold, milky-white eyes that bore into him, each second of their gaze like a shower of ice magic rending his flesh.

It has no voice to speak with - but he can hear its words loud and clear. Another volley of razor-sharp ice shards.

'She stopped you from destroying the world; this is what you will always be to her. Remember your place’.

Gasping for air - and yet finding no relief, no breath to catch in the cloying vapours of the dream realm - he stumbles backwards, and falls in.

There are tears in his eyes again when he wakes up, and they are cold like his barren, solitary bed.


End file.
